A bi-partisan embarrassment

Something called American University’s Center for Democracy and Election Management has established “a bipartisan commission” to examine problems with the U.S. election system, the Washington Post reports. The commission will be headed by Jimmy Carter and James Baker. Tom Daschle will also particpate.
I didn’t know that universities got to appoint bi-partisan commissions — I thought they just issued studies. I also thought that bi-partisan commissions consisted of Republicans and Democrats, not people who like America and people who don’t particularly care for it. (Perhaps there’s a relationship between these two bits of confusion on my part).
The Reuters report that the Post carries (I also thought that major American newspapers could report on purely American political events without enlisting the Brits) reminds us that Carter has monitored elections all over the world. It neglects to point out that he couldn’t be bothered to show up for the transformational Iraqi elections. Heaven help it if Carter were associated with an election that might make America look very good.
The Reuters report is big enough to acknowledge that “international monitors” thought our 2004 elections “were mostly fair.” However, it notes the existence of “exceedingly long lines that [allegedly] kept voters from the polls” in places like Ohio. The article does not mention the substantial allegations of massive voter fraud in Washington state and Wisconsin that, if it occurred, probably changed the outome of key races there. I don’t expect that Jimmy Carter will mention this either.